The Los Angeles Police Department arrested the suspect caught on video lighting a Molotov cocktail on Sunday and throwing it at the department’s Topanga Station, setting it ablaze.
According to the Los Angeles Police Department, Jonathon Rosin, 24, was detained just after the incident occurred over the weekend.
Security footage of the attack, shared on Twitter by Fox LA’s Bill Melugin, shows Rosin walking up to the doors of the building around 1 a.m., lighting a glass bottle filled with a flammable liquid before throwing it against the station’s doors. After setting the building located at 21501 Schoenborn Street on fire, the suspect is seen walking away.
“Rosin lit a glass bottle that contained a flammable liquid and threw it at the front window of the police station. Upon contact with the window the bottle shattered and ignited the flammable liquid,” the department’s statement read. “The incident was witnessed by multiple LAPD personnel on the station’s CCTV system. The flames were extinguished promptly by a supervisor.”
The officers who witnessed the attack immediately pursued the suspect on foot. After Rosin’s arrest, officers “observed that he smelled like gasoline.” Officials said Rosin was uncooperative, and a motive for the firebombing has not been established, Fox 11 reported.
Rosin was booked for igniting an explosive and a misdemeanor warrant. He is being held on $501,000 bail. LAPD Major Crimes Division is managing the investigation with the support of LAFD Arson Counter Terrorism Section (ACTS).
“Yesterday, someone threw a Molotov cocktail @LAPDTopanga. We are horrified that @LAPDHQ officers were attacked like this,” the LA Police Foundation wrote on Twitter. “Attacks on law enforcement must stop!”
After the dangerous attack, the Los Angeles Police Protective League issued a statement calling Rosin a “cowardly individual” who put “lives at risk,” but the group said it isn’t confident he will be held accountable.
“Jonathan Rosin, the cowardly individual who firebombed the occupied Topanga police station, must be held accountable for putting lives at risk. However, we are not hopeful he will be,” the group’s statement said. “Unfortunately, with a district attorney like George Gascón, there’s a good chance the firebomber’s crime will be pled down to starting an illegal campfire with a sentence recommendation of no s’mores at bedtime and a group therapy session to determine how society contributed to this crime. These attacks targeting law enforcement must stop, and those who carry out these attacks must be taken off our streets. It would be great to have a DA that agreed.”
